Characterizing freshwater and nutrient fluxes to West Falmouth Harbor, Massachusetts

FIELD PROGRAM: Instruments to measure water flow, conductivity, temperature, surface wave characteristics, near-bottom turbulence, suspended sediment concentrations, and nutrients were deployed and recovered at 4 locations in West Falmouth Harbor and 3 locations in Buzzards Bay. In Buzzards Bay (2009 only): Platform 862 was deployed on the west side of the Cape Cod Canal adjacent to Massachusetts Maritime. Platform 859 was deployed in the middle of the bay at: 41.6346, -70.7255. Measurements include currents, waves, temperature, salinity, pressure, light attenuation and dissolved oxygen. Platform 860 was deployed to the southeast of the bay at 41.5607, -70.6780. Measurements include currents, waves, temperature, salinity, pressure, light attenuation and dissolved oxygen. In West Falmouth Harbor (2010 only): Biological fouling on sensors often degrades acoustical and optical data quality during deployment. Organisms grow on the instrument transducers and gradually block acoustical pulses and light transmission, These instruments were serviced regularly to clean the transducers and recalibrate where needed. Where possible adjustments to correct for effects of biofouling were made; uncorrectable points were removed. Platforms 887, 888, and 901 were deployed at the mouth of the harbor, nominally 41.6063, -70.6512. Measurements include currents, temperature, salinity, pH, chlorophyll-a, dissolved oxygen and pressure. Platforms 885 and 886 were deployed at the junction site where the two arms of the harbor meet, nominally 41.6045, -70.6440. Measurements include currents, temperature, salinity, pH, chlorophyll-a, dissolved oxygen and pressure. Platforms 882, 883, and 884 were deployed at Mashapaquit Creek, nominally 41.6089, -70.6371. Measurements include currents, temperature, salinity, pH, chlorophyll-a, nitrate, dissolved oxygen and pressure. Platform 900 was deployed in the south arm at 41.6014, -70.6462. Measurements include currents, dissolved oxygen and temperature.

DATA PROCESSING Data processing was conducted using the proprietary software for each instrument, and (or) specialized software developed by the USGS. The proprietary software was often used to download data from the instruments and export the data to ASCII-files. Post-processing of the raw binary or ASCII files was accomplished using USGS software developed in the MATLAB (http://www.mathworks.com/) programming language. As part of the processing, instrument-specific formats were converted to the EPIC-standard NetCDF format (http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/epic/) and scientific units. Data were carefully checked for inconsistencies, time drift, and other problems and then edited if needed. The beginning and end of each data series were truncated to remove data collected out of water. After final editing, the best basic version of the data file that includes all variables recorded at the basic sampling interval (the fastest rate at which the sensor sampled) is published.

Edits to the metadata were made to fix any errors that MP v 2.9.32 flagged. This is necessary to enable the metadata to be successfully harvested for various data catalogs. In some cases, this meant adding text "Information unavailable" or "Information unavailable from original metadata" for those required fields that were left blank. Other minor edits were probably performed (title, publisher, publication place, etc.). The online link to the experiment was added to the identification section. Fixed the online link to a cross-reference. The metadata date (but not the metadata creator) was edited to reflect the date of these changes. The metadata available from a harvester may supersede metadata bundled within a download file. Compare the metadata dates to determine which metadata file is most recent.

Added keywords section with USGS persistent identifier as theme keyword.